Affluent Orange County town roiled by police killing of Black homeless man

Reptile

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Big questions loomed Friday over the death of Kurt Andras Reinhold, who was fatally shot by Orange County sheriff’s deputies in the beachfront town of San Clemente.

How did this well-educated, churchgoing Black man, who coached youth soccer and had two children of his own, end up living on the streets of south Orange County? What pushed him into mental illness and homelessness? Why did two deputies, part of a specialized detail to help people who are homeless, confront him Wednesday?

And then there’s the doubt that nagged at neighbors Laura Engeman and Rani Craig as they headed Thursday to an impromptu memorial near the spot where Reinhold was killed: “How did a routine interaction from a homeless outreach effort escalate into a gun incident?” Engeman asked.

Reinhold’s name has been added to the long list of Black men and women killed by police under questionable circumstances across the country: George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Brendon Glenn, Michael Brown and many others.


Those deaths have fueled a summer of coast-to-coast protests against systemic racism. And they have spurred calls for police reform, including proposals to strip police of the routine responsibility of dealing with people who are mentally ill or homeless.


Awaiting body cams.
 
Im sure it has to do with the suspect not complying? Thoughts and feelings of safety .
God bless
 
Anytime you resist arrest chances are you will get hurt or killed. I would say that probably a high percentage of people resist arrest. If black people are truly worried abot getting killed, then just comply with the officers. If you do that at least you'll be alive to get your day in court.
 
Watching the cell phone video, it does not appear as though they were initially trying to arrest him, just move him out of the middle of the street. And the officers were attempting to do so using just body positioning to block and redirect him to the side of the street. Several times they get him maneuvered close to the curb, but he evades the officers and moves back toward the center of the road. For most of the video they appear to be avoiding physical contact while trying to move him out of the road.

Reinhold on the other hand is extremely belligerent. Yelling. Lunging at and striking out at the officers. Occasionally hitting their arms and hands. I'm guessing he was really jacked up on something. He's acting quite impaired and can be seen carrying some kind of tall can of drink.

Everything goes south once the officers get him out of the street. Unfortunately the cell video moves away right at the point the confrontation gets physical, so it's impossible to see who initiated the physical conflict. Reinhold is on the curb, and one of the officers is very close to him, but when the video pans back they're already wrestling. At that point it does become an attempt to restrain Reinhold, with all three on the ground. No weapons seem to be used until the very end. I cannot see any guns, tasers or nightsticks being used. All we hear is one of the officers yell "He's got my gun", then we hear several shots.

IMSHO the officers tried to keep the situation at the lowest level of force needed to move Reinhold out of the street where he was a danger to both himself and others. All bets were off once Reinhold apparently had a gun: that's then a deadly force situation.
 
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